


Under the Moons of Darillium: Part 12 The Forests of Sadness

by Stardance1



Series: Under the Moons of Darillium: A Night of Adventures [12]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005), Doctor Who (Big Finish Audio), The Diary of River Song (Big Finish Audio)
Genre: Darillium, F/M, Post-Episode: 2015 Xmas The Husbands of River Song
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-26 16:43:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17145368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stardance1/pseuds/Stardance1
Summary: The Tardis has a mission for River and the Doctor. Can they solve it together, or will they be trapped in the Forests of Sadness for Christmas?





	Under the Moons of Darillium: Part 12 The Forests of Sadness

**Author's Note:**

> Please note this is part 12 of a series.

The Doctor sat across from River in their bedroom.  
His eyebrows narrowed in concentration as he reclined into his worn armchair with a somber sigh.  
He tapped one finger impatiently on his cheek, and then, when an idea finally dawned on him, he leaned forward extending his hand toward her with a raised pointed finger compelling her to listen. 

"Would you rather …. only see the Universe as a solipsistic physicist, thinking of it as a block of frozen time where spacetime has no dimension… Or…. as a neoplatonist thinking that we’re all an indivisible, indistinguishable part of the transcendent One?"

River sat on their bed, a mound of pillows separating her from the headboard.  
When the Doctor spoke, she paused half-stroke as she painted her last toenail a festive metallic silver.  
She met his gaze tenaciously, smiling softly to herself at the twinkle in his eye. 

He took these games so seriously, her husband. 

She smirked to herself as she tightened the cap on the lacquer bottle before jotting a quick note to herself in her Darillium journal.  
Across the room she could hear his fingers drum a steady beat of restless enthusiasm into his armrest.  
She struggled to control the corners of her mouth as they pulled into a genuine smile of enjoyment. 

She shook out her curls. “Neither.” she responded defiantly, "I would choose to think of the Universe as the poets do: the mystics and the sufists."  
"So when you hear hoofbeats?"  
"I’d look for a zebra." 

It was a good answer. And he loved her, so he begrudgingly accepted.  
He crossed his arms across his chest.  
"Your turn,” he challenged.

She stretched her arms up and over and then rested nonchalantly back on the pillows.  
She constantly flabbergasted him, which would be unbelievably frustrating... if he wasn’t left completely bewitched by her wiles. 

River smiled, as though she were reaching into a limitless pool of prepared questions.

"Would you rather ...travel exclusively by vortex manipulator, or have stayed on Gallifrey forever?”  
She was teasing him.  
Fine  
“Can I have the next 1000 years to think about it? I mean look what it did to your hair."  
River’s eyes flashed like a wildfire…  
He laughed... "I’m kidding, of course vortex manipulator. And I love your hair." 

River licked her lips, her face full of confidence and moxie. "Go on."

"Let’s say, you were up against the Faction Paradox… they’re using technology to violate the laws of causality, and in another moment, the entire Universe, all of existence, will fold in on itself and implode.” He paused for dramatic effect… "Would you rather… have the Tardis available for only one trip, or all of the other technology in the Tardis, including the Sonic Screwdrivers."

She looked up, and caught his eye.  
She wondered if that had actually happened.  
She’d get it out of him later, one way or another… 

For a moment, River lost her train of thought.  
Actually she quite lost herself.  
It was those eyes, it couldn’t be helped.  
When he looked on her, the intensity of his eyes was deadlier than the fire of the daleks, deeper than the largest supervoid.  
Her resolve to treat the game stoically crumbled away and her face broke into her signature wide dazzling grin. 

That man would drive her crazy... if she didn’t absolutely adore him.  
Alway and completely. 

“I’m sorry my love, but my answer is neither, again." 

Incredulously he shot up like a rocket, striding over to the bed to stand over her in two long steps.  
"River, you can’t keep doing that! You always make me pick one or the other, why can you always talk your way out of it?"  
She had to bite her lip to keep from laughing. She shrugged... “Spoilers?"  
He frowned at her, but sat at the edge of the bed to hear her response, "Fine, so what’s your answer.”  
She lowered her eyes and then looked back over to him to meet his gaze again, wantonly... unflinchingly. "If I was up against the Faction Paradox and could have only one thing... I’d pick you."  
“Me?"  
“You."  
“Why?"  
"Because I trust you, implicitly. Because we make a great team. And because…. Do you remember that time that we were in Leadworth for a barbecue with my parents and my dad’s grill broke? You found a local Costco… we snuck in with a psychic paper membership card, and then we proceeded to run throughout the store grabbing ridiculous odds and ends: paperclips and coffee grinders and scales and a couple of transistor radios. Half an hour later you’d somehow assembled a grill that cooked food in half the time, used half the gas, played music, and dispensed hard candy."  
The Doctor got a wistful look in his eye and he continued her story… “The sun was setting and we were listening to a Chet Baker record when Blue Room came on. You danced with me and Rory got annoyed."  
"Well your hands may have wandered a bit during that waltz."  
“What?!? These hands?” he ran a fingertip slowly across the blade of her bare shoulder and down her arm… "Never!”

River’s breath caught in her chest. 

"Stop it! It’s my turn….would you rather… eat a case full of overripe soft squishy pears and have unlimited napkins,  
Or …. have a case full of Jammie Dodgers but only one cup of tea?"

He tut-tutted in feigned vexation, all the while inching closer to her on the bed.  
He lowered his voice. "You’re a diabolical mastermind…. a… a… fiendish psychopath!"  
River laughed. She similarly lowered her voice, and whispered back, smiling, "Yes, but we knew that already."  
"Of course, as long as you’re my bespoke fiendish psychopath….” he leaned over to her, raking his hand through her hair, pulling her nape toward him and then softly brushing his lips back and forth against hers.  
"Don’t distract me” she whispered against his lips,"answer the question."  
"I’d eat the pears and wipe the dribble off of my chin. Having all of those Jammie Dodgers and only one cup of tea would be unparalleled horror. The likes of which could inspire Joseph Conrad.” The Doctor moved even closer to her and began to trail kisses down her neck and then mumbled against her skin, “It’d be torture.”  
River moaned helplessly and the Doctor suddenly sat back up.  
He made a face at River and sighed…. “We both know that I could never really eat those pears. So I pass...Your turn again...” 

“Fine.” River put her head on the pillows and closed her eyes, suddenly not sure what game they were playing, or who was winning….but she took her turn again nonetheless…. "Would you rather travel unrestrictedly through time and space, but only land on Sundays, Mondays, and Tuesdays… Or have just a few years of travel but land exclusively on Saturdays."

The Doctor reached out and stroked her cheek.  
Her eyes opened and he spoke to her in complete sincerity, softly, apologetically, matter-of-factly, "Actually I’ve rather rethought my position on this whole temporal tipping points. I’ve gotten a whole renewed appreciation for Sundays Mondays and Tuesdays …"  
“Really?"  
"Yes, I think they’re rather marvelous if you spend them with the right person…. In fact...”, he reached forward and bopped her nose, "a lifetime of Sundays, Mondays, and Tuesdays with the right person could end up being more exciting than any old Saturday..." 

River didn’t blink, she didn’t breath, but a second later she had somehow moved herself into his lap and buried her face in his neck. 

He stroked her hair and spoke softly…. “Hey now, we’ll have none of that… it’s my turn after all…."  
He tilted his head slightly to whisper into her ear…. "Would you rather….” His breath was warm and his lips tickled the lobe of her ear.  
As he spoke his arms dropped around her and he wrapped them tightly around her waist, pulling her closer to him.  
About 5 seconds into his question her mind vehemently tried to clamp onto his voice in an attempt to piece the individual words together, but her concentration couldn’t hold on long enough to make sense of them.  
They swirled away awash in feeling.  
Over the sound of her own hearts, she could hear but scant pieces, only enough for her mouth to go dry, ...only enough to understand the sentiment.

She moistened her lips, sure as she ever was of her answer...“Both.” 

The Doctor groaned, his strong generous hands moved urgently over body.  
River had one arm around his neck, and was rather convinced she couldn’t let go.  
With her other hand she clutched his shoulder and tightened her grasp.  
The black french tips of her lacquered nails pressed into his skin.

His neck.  
She loved his neck...how it curved as he stretched it toward the stars.  
Don't let go, her mind whispered.  
Don’t look at his face right now.  
Don’t fall into his gaze.  
She was already at a precipice and another step would send her tumbling down.  
She held her breath.  
She only had two hearts, and at moments like these, when he said things like that, she was afraid they’d burst. 

He pulled her fully on top of him, but still she refused to let go.  
A bit concerned, he tried to coax her now, but instead she whispered into his ear… “Show me.”  
He moved his head and for an instant, his eyes met hers.  
In all the Universe, no sky sparkled like the pools of light in her eyes.  
He took the invitation wholeheartedly.  
He rolled them together and when he was on top of her, he nuzzled the hollow of her collarbone…  
The soft black silk of her square neck blouse caressed his cheek.  
Through the very fabric his mouth found the firm toffee nib crowns of her breasts, then trailed kisses across her abdomen.  
With the swiftest tug he disrobed her. 

She could have lamented how many nice tops she lost this way… but she’d sooner set light to her own closet at this moment.  
His scent engulfed her, infused and intoxicated her.  
She willed it to permeate her skin and brand her. 

There were times, so many times, when he would make love to her like this… with such fervency and urgency and passion that River could barely hang on. 

And at the same time, she never wanted to let go again.  
Couldn’t imagine ever having to let go again.

Why were they always tormented they'd have to let go again?

She wanted to adhere to him through the sheen of perspiration lustering his skin, absorb the racing of his hearts into her own chest, amalgamate the sinew of her arms to the muscles that tautened his back. By the time he reached inside of her, his fingertips penetrating her soul, her gasps and moans had turned into screams.  
Her hips moved closer to him in a rhythm all their own, her back arched like a crescent moon, and her hands did anything that they could to clasp him closer, to have him thrust and drive into her until he screamed her name. 

And by then, River could barely recall her name. 

She closed her eyes and held him on top of her, inside of her, as long as she could…  
He whispered eternal endearments into her ear... and River knew how much more they meant to someone who has seen eternity, knows eternity, and chooses still to love you for it. She knew because she chose it too. She pressed the moment into their minds, into their memories, and he pressed his forehead to hers accepting the bond. 

When finally they separated, he placed a breathless kiss on her forehead with a grin.  
There wasn’t enough air in the room to mollify their lungs.  
"I think I’ll take a quick shower … what would you like to do for dinner….”  
River’s hearts were still going about 2,000 miles per hour…. “Soup…. I mean there's a stew.”  
"And when are we having it?” He smiled running a knuckle across her flushed cheek.  
"It’s in the slow cooker yet, so another 3 or 4 hours?"  
“Perfect!” he grinned down at her "I’ll make tea and bring it into the library for us. Meet me there in 20 mins?"  
River nodded..."And we’re just having tea?”  
“I’ll make sandwiches too, I’m not a troglodyte…. although I cast off any implication therein to cave dwellers. I’ve known some mighty fine ones in my time."  
"Point taken."  
"Good. Hurry up” he walked out then stuck his head back in and winked at her….”and we’ll play 20 questions."

_______________________________

Still abed, River was laughing to herself and trying to pace the racing of her hearts by covering her chest with her hands.  
She stood up and stretched a full yogic salutation to the moons of Darillium, before committing her pen to paper and augmenting the tales in her Journal.

In the next room the Doctor was composing a new song in the steaming cascade of the shower.  
His voice scatted along to the melange of percussion performed by the downrush of water accompanied by the dancing of fingers on tile. 

And all around them the Tardis pulsated with an electric current of energy charged with purpose. 

She was elated.  
Well... she was always happiest when they were here together, her thief and her child.

According to the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus, you could never step into the same river twice.  
And while the Tardis theoretically could image doing just that…possibly while accidentally ripping a hole in the Universe... in all honesty, she never had to worry with these two.  
They carried her topsy turvey from adventure to adventure, crisscrossing the fabric of spacetime.  
She had known the Universe with them and through them. 

But sometimes her role was different, for only she knew the full path forward.  
The path that always was: an emerging pattern laden with retention and bursting with protection, leading to a past that was a future. 

Even now on Darillium, these golden years for her, she could not rest, for while her role was usually to take them where they wanted to go, when they wanted to go… sometimes it was rather to take them where they needed to be. 

Her coding output chortled…  
That hour was almost upon them.  
And they had no idea. 

Her telepathic circuitry coursed to life, multi-fiber hybrid cables vibrated and hummed like the treble strings of a piano, the knobs on her console twisted like tuning keys, and her generators murmurated like an orchestra primed to take flight. 

“Oh my dear timelords,” she thought with a wink, “hold on to your seat.” 

_______________________________

“Did you feel that?” River asked cautiously, as she looked around the library with a dart of her eyes.  
The Doctor raised his eyebrows and cast an amused look at her, “You mean the flutter of your fear?”  
River’s jaw dropped at the affront, she held out her hand for him to observe, “My hand is as steady as a surgeon!”  
“And yet, I’m the Doctor,” he retorted cleverly, bending his head down and kissing her outstretched offering.  
River set her teacup down in the saucer with clang, “I know the answer already. It’s the Panopticon in the Capital City on Gallifrey.”  
The Doctor stood up abruptly, absolutely beside himself. “You can’t answer, you haven’t even asked if I was thinking of an animal, vegetable, or a mineral or... or... or a person, place, or a thing! That’s the first rule of 20 questions, River! Everyone knows that!!!”  
“And I would have asked that, but you get a certain look in your eye when you think of Gallifrey,… so…”  
The Doctor sat down with a loud harrumph, and both he and River simultaneously lifted their teacups to their lips.  
Just then, a jolt ever so slightly rattled the books in the room.  
Immediately their eyes met across the table.  
River nodded, yes, she had felt it too. “Doctor, we weren’t going anywhere, and yet, we’ve just landed.”  
No more questions were needed.  
They put down their teacups.  
He reached his hand out toward her and she took it in hers.  
And together, they ran. 

______________________________________  
In the control room, all of the monitors and instruments were blank.  
With everything offline, there was no point in dawdling further. 

The Doctor hastily pulled River toward the door, and together they paused haltingly before opening it. 

Ever so carefully, the Doctor set it ajar and peered out.  
He stepped outdoors and River stood steadfastly beside him. 

They looked around and their eyes widened as their faces traveled up, higher and higher, almost to the heavens.  
They were surrounded on all sides by rock-cliffs and steep vertical mountain slopes.  
If someone had come along and chipped a crevice into the floor of a mountain, it wouldn’t be much bigger than where they stood now. 

It was a forest stuffed into a land-locked ravine. 

The Doctor turned and used his Sonic Screwdriver to zap on the lantern bulb atop the Tardis.  
He heard River gasp. 

He turned and looked around.  
It wasn’t a forest stuffed into a land-locked ravine.  
It was a post-post-apocolyptic tinderbox. 

Fallen trees were strewn about, upturned roots like clouds of chaos above their own corpses.  
Some trees looked an ashen gray, others a sickly brown, while a few towered above, too proud to bend they were solely surviving on their resilience. 

Then a sound came, like the fall of rain, or the rustle of leaves in the autumn wind.  
But it was neither.  
River pointed at the glass prisms of light that crumbled to the ground from the highest branches.

“Doctor,” she said, the horror evident in her voice, “what is that? Why did the Tardis bring us here?” 

The Doctor zapped the lantern again with his Sonic, increasing the strength of the voltage. It was clearer now, they weren’t leaves or raindrops, but a deluge of death falling all around them. 

________________________________ 

The Doctor ran forward and stretched out his hand.  
Almost immediately he caught what he was needing. 

It lay in his hand like a delicate snowflake too fragile to melt.  
It had transparent wings almost the width of his hand, with a long and graceful body like that of a dragonfly, but inlaid with the chromatic patterns of a Tiffany mosaic. 

All around, they were surrounded by a communal burial plot of tens of thousands. 

The Doctor was so disturbed, he couldn’t move, he couldn’t place this dead creature on the ground, just adding to the heap of slaughtered. 

“River! Scan, get your computer and scan everything!” 

River took out her sonic and immediately began to take in as much as she could. 

This is why she traveled with the Doctor.  
She couldn’t stop time, she couldn’t change the course of fate, but when they truly needed each other, when she could make a difference to the mission they were on… she wanted to be here. Every time. 

She began to catalogue her observations for him…. 

"The temperature is about 30 degrees warmer here than at the top of the mountain, however recent data shows that is not always the case. That creature that you are holding is native to Darillium, it is locally known as a Crystal Odonate. They hibernate during the nights, to emerge and mate during the day, but their colonies have dwindled with the loss of Darillium forests….  
Doctor…” River’s voice suddenly dropped to no more than a whisper… 

He walked over to her immediately and looked down at her screen…. She continued in a low, fearful tone, “Doctor, the computer is picking up massive readings of high pitched ultrasonic noise…” 

“Is it the Crystal Odonate?” 

River shook her head, sparks of terror reaching her eyes, “The Odonate are in a suspended animation from the cold. It’s the trees. The trees are screaming!”

__________________________ 

A fierce gust of wind rolled down the slope of the mountain, right through the bones of River and the Doctor. 

She shivered for both of them. 

A loud clamor filled their ears… the sound of wood crackling and blistering as it was torn from its roots and its soil. The thud of death echoed as it hit the ground. 

Another tree, perilously close to where they stood, began to sway in the darkness.  
Its branches hung heavy with dormant Odonate, draped in layered clusters like the crystals of a chandelier. 

River took a small step back toward the Tardis. “Darling.” was all she said.  
Neither of them toward the other, but somehow their hands found each other. 

“Run!” he screamed, and pulled her into the Tardis. 

They slammed the door shut a second before the tree fell exactly where they had stood. 

“What was that, Doctor, why are we here? They’re dead, how can we make a difference now?” 

“I don’t River. But we’ll have to figure it out together,” he said looking over at the Tardis console. 

It was cast in shadow. Everything was still offline. 

The Doctor and River were trapped. 

__________________________ 

River uncorked a fizzy cider and served a glass for herself and the Doctor.  
She would have preferred tea, but the Tardis was stubbornly refusing to turn anything on, save for the lights. 

The Doctor took his glass and thanked her.  
He stood up and pulled out her chair for her, stopping to cover her with an extra jumper for the cold.  
He sat down next to her, dragging his chair closer. 

“River, the forest out there should be creating a thick blanket of warmth. But those creatures died from exposure! And those trees: they have water from the mountain, masses of moonlight for photosynthesis, plentiful soil… Did your scans reveal anything that could be causing this?” 

River scrolled through the data and shook her head in frustration.  
After a moment further readings populated, and she stopped.  
"There’s something here that doesn’t make sense to me, Doctor… in this chemical analysis, all of the trees, both dead and alive, have a tremendously low level of carbon.”  
"What kinds of trees are they River?”  
“Um, on one side of the forest there seem to be mostly purple lythrum trees and on the other… juglone trees…” 

River wasn’t sure if it was his hearts or hers that she heard, but suddenly everything stilled.  
The Doctor didn’t budge, but his eyes focused like lasers onto her screen. 

“River! River! River! I should have seen it! The trees aren’t just dying, they’re killing each other! We’re trapped in a war zone.”

“It’s the carbon! It’s all about the carbon!” the Doctor shouted as he ran out the door.  
River pulled him back inside by the back of his hoodie just as another tree crashed down where he would have been standing.  
He reached out his hand and refocused the lantern light of the Tardis with a flick of his sonic.

“Look for scorch marks River, anything that could signify a landing pattern…” 

From the entryway of the Tardis, the Doctor and River looked out, searching everywhere for a clue to anything… 

“Look!” River pointed to the top southern cliffs of the mountain…. 

There, thick greasy black burns coated the stone.  
They were circular and overlapping, coated with grey and white ash.

It was proof.  
Proof that something had been there.  
Something that didn’t belong. 

____________________________ 

“Of course,” the Doctor said raking his hand through his hair, “Aliens scan planets for resources all the time, and what do they search for? Oxygen! Nitrogen! Carbon! Nitrous oxide! Darillium was ripe for the harvesting and they sucked the stores of carbon from those trees! It’s night on this side of Darillium, so of course, the trees had massive stores of carbon to get them through, but whoever it was that attacked probably didn’t realize that they’d create a war zone between two fierce species of trees!” 

“Have you seen them before Doctor? What are they doing?” 

“The juglone are infamous across many star systems…. if they are stressed or resources become scarce, they release a toxic formulation into the soil to rid themselves of competition. Under normal circumstances, other plants die and the juglone stabilize. But here River, the other species is just as Machiavellian! It is similarly prepared to advance its own chances of survival through chemical warfare!” 

“So the trees are dying, but what about the Odonate?” 

“It’s a vicious cycle that we call nature! The trees communicate threats through a massive wood wide web network of fungi below the ground, and as they attack each other and more and more trees die… the land and Odonate become more exposed… those cold fronts blowing down the mountains, that wouldn’t happen if the forest came back to life.” 

“How can we stop it?” 

“That’s simple River, youth, youth is the answer! The youth will change the future!” 

River shook her head, “Doctor, you don’t understand, rule 1 of survival. Go after the young and the weak first. There’s only one or two seedlings left on each side!”  
_______________________________ 

“River! It’s our only chance, where are the seedlings, find the seedlings!?!”  
The Doctor ran out the door and River picked up her handheld computer and ran after him.  
Together they dodged trees and crunched through piles of dead odonate several meters deep. 

“To your right!” River shouted ahead and made a beeline to a sapling.

They both stood, face to face, a young sapling between them. 

“Now that we’ve found one what do we do?”  
“Convince the trees to be kind?”  
“Doctor!”  
“No seriously that’s what we have to do! We have to show them that their future is intertwined, make them see that they need each other to survive… that if a tree falls in forest and no one is there to hear it, there never was a forest. Because at the end of the day our friendships, our alliances, how we see ourselves and how we see the world, that’s all that matters River. There’s can’t be objectivity without subjectivity because each of us make up the fabric of the Universe, and destroying each other means destroying our world and ultimately ourselves!”  
River grabbed him and kissed him on the lips.  
“That’s it! Shut up! Just shut up! That’s it. If they destroy each other they destroy themselves! I know what to do! Stay with the sapling!”  
River ran off into the forest and the Doctor knelt next to young tree and whispered encouragingly to it. 

____________________________ 

River raced through the maze of standing trees and fallen trunks, branches scraped at her face and the bodies of the Odonate obscured her vision as they fell.  
She purposely threw herself to the ground at the base of one of the tallest mother trees, knowing it wouldn’t sacrifice itself to kill her.  
On the ground she rifled through vegetation until she found a handful of young branches: scion branches. And then she ran back to the Doctor. 

“River what are you doing?”  
“Peel some small edges around that trunk!” she said hurriedly, as her fingers worked nimbly on the gathered twigs. She wrapped forest vines around the trunk to seal the grafts onto the young sapling. “Now for the Sonic!” she said, looking up at the Doctor.  
“The Sonic doesn’t work on wood!”  
River winked at the Doctor, “Trust me!”  
She activated her Sonic, and a moment later, a pod of medic bay nanogens emerged from the Tardis in a golden wave. They floated to the air and sealed off the grafts, creating a brand new tree.  
“You see Doctor,” River smiled broadly, “a whole new life, immune to the poison of both sides, and carrying the survival of each sides in its branches.”  
The nanogens having accepted the template, proceeded to move on through the forest, replanting roots and revitalizing trees. As their swarm dispersed through the forest, River and the Doctor walked hand in hand back to the Tardis. 

With his sonic, the Doctor expanded the protective atmosphere of the Tardis, and sat down in front of the door to watch the forest heal, a peaceful smile on his face.  
____________________________ 

River emerged from the Tardis with two mugs of tea and sat down next to the Doctor.  
“Good news, everything is on again.”  
The Doctor clinked his mug to hers in celebration.  
“You did good River.”  
She shrugged. “I just helped to finish your plan. You would have gotten there, but we have after dinner plans we will need to get to…”  
“Really?”  
“Spoilers,” she said, and reclined her head on his shoulder.  
“You know, grafts may not solve the problem forever, we’ll need to continue tending to the garden.”  
“It makes for a good change, doesn’t it? To stay and see it through?”  
“I was thinking the same thing, also that I’ll need to borrow your sonic trowel.” 

River’s laughter could be heard reverberating through the forest and echoing back off the stone slopes of the ravine. 

______________________________  
The Doctor set the table while River sent some special instructions to the Tardis.  
They ate and talked about the Doctor’s adventures with Johnny Appleseed across the rugged American frontier.  
The Doctor had advised him to graft his trees, but sadly Johnny insisted on seeds.  
As a result, most of his apples were excessively tart and could only be used in the local production of cider.  
A good idea for a time, but of course most were chopped down during prohibition. 

“I wish I could have seen you!” River said, “Both of you walking barefoot through the wilderness!”  
“It’s quite nice sometimes. Like Steve Jobs!”  
“Clever minds must thing alike then,” said River with a wink. 

River stood up to clear the table, but the Doctor touched her hand and motioned her to wait….  
“River, Johnny Appleseed, Steve Jobs, the trees… everything is touched by sadness when you set off to fight the world alone…. those trees have each other now thanks to you, and I have you to thank as well, because I know whatever we have to face, we won’t face it alone.”  
______________________________ 

River was still smiling later as she compelled the Doctor to change for Alphonse's.  
He had emerged in minutes in a clean charcoal hoodie with a jet black pattern of randomized streaks.  
Actually it was quite nice River thought, peaking out from her wardrobe and making eyes at the fit of his trousers.  
She emerged almost as quickly, in a black mesh dress which had strategically placed asymmetrical strips of black bamboo silk.  
The Doctor’s eyes widened in shock and passion at the same time.  
“What are you wearing?”  
“Something appropriate for the evening,” she responded with a wink.  
She threw open the doors of the Tardis and walked the Doctor into a large Christmas celebration at Alphonse’s. 

“Doctor, you’re here to play a gig!” River shouted over the din of the party as she pulled him across the dance floor toward a stage at the far end of the ballroom, “This is the family and friends staff Christmas party, and I promised that you’d do a set!”  
The Doctor laughed incredulously, “What?!? But River… I haven’t…”  
“Shut up! You are always ready to shine. And I’ll be right there with you on the sound board. Plus these are our friends and their families. Inspire them.”  
She handed him his guitar. He paused for a nanosecond before nodding and taking it into his arms.  
He bopped her nose. “Let’s go!”  
______________________________ 

The Doctor played the best hits of the 5 galaxy star system, and threw in some personal favorites.  
After two delightful hours where Alphonse's staff and their families danced and sang along, the Doctor finally slowed down his electric guitar and dedicated a soft acoustic interpretation of Johnny Cash's, “I Walk the Line” to his beloved wife.  
Most of the staff had attended their wedding, and they all knew them so well by now as frequent diners, so they smiled knowingly as they watched River. She, of course, had been on the sound board all night, and with the connected earpiece, it was almost as though she could hear his voice directly in her mind, as though the lyrics were traveling directly from his thoughts to her hearts, and she almost melted off of the stage.  
She covered her earpiece with her hand and willed his voice deeper. She’d never heard him sing that song before.  
Not once.  
And it was beautiful. For his closing number, the Doctor invited River to the stage to sing with him. The crowd cheered her on to the microphone.  
Not that River needed it, she loved to sing with the Doctor. And let's be honest, she was anything but shy on stage. They did a rendition of the Pretender’s “I’ll Stand By You”. River's voice was deep and throaty and full of meaning. Adding that to the Doctor's accompaniment with his electric guitar and his deep vocals adding resonance to the refrain, it was no surprise that they had the audience standing in ovation for them, with quite a few with tears in their eyes. 

When the Doctor was done with his set and accepting the felicitations of their friends, they retired back to the Tardis, full of laughter and music.  
“Well that was no Jim the Fish karaoke!” the Doctor said laughing and twirling River.  
River touched his face gently, “Art should be shared. You were amazing, and I was so proud!”  
________________________________ 

The Doctor took River back to their secret forest ravine.  
She smiled as she looked out at the healed forest.  
The Doctor leaned down and whispered in her ear, “wait for it…” ... then with a buzz from his Sonic, he turned the lights of the Tardis off.  
They stood together in the narrow valley, under the far distant moons of Darillium, surrounded by the sweet smells of the forest. In the darkness, the trees began to glow… like a field of Christmas trees dipped in stars.  
River audibly gasped and both the Doctor and the Tardis smiled. 

“You might recall I was once late for a date because of a meteor storm in the Garn Belt? I landed on a planet where the trees were used as street lamps. I remembered earlier that they used nanoparticles to help them activate the enzyme luciferase in the plant’s own DNA or added implants of bacteria from rainforest mushrooms and sea creatures. You inspired me today River, so I sort of tweaked the nanogens to temporarily add a blue and white glow to the forest… like the phytoplankton blooms on bioluminescent beaches. Because… well, I thought you deserved a proper Christmas tree... forest” 

River would have thanked him.  
Or thrown herself in his arms.  
But she never wanted to look away. 

He sat down and pulled her down into his lap while she gazed at the trees.  
"They're amazing...I never want to leave."  
"Maybe we should keep Christmas everyday then?"  
"Bless us, every one?"  
He kissed the tip of her nose. “Exactly."

___________________________ 

River kissed the Doctor passionately, but before he could regain control of his senses, she got up and ran inside the Tardis.  
"Am I supposed to follow?” he called after her…  
“No!" She called back…”Please gather firewood."  
The Doctor made a small fire pit with stones from the clearing.  
He started a campfire and sat down, waiting for River to return... The ravine was cool, and the air thick with forest and life. He watched the shadows cast by the light of the fire, and smiled at the stillness of the moment. 

He didn’t have to wait too long for River.  
She came out moments later, carrying a large burlap sack, copiously filled with marbles.  
She poured them out on the ground, where they fell like beautiful colored hail.  
He could see the swirls of color in each glass orb, illuminated by the flames.  
The Doctor smiled thinking that they reminded him of a galaxy, each one its own unique planet. 

River knelt down and began to set up a game of Ringer.  
She grabbed a stick and made a wide circle on the ground, at least ten feet in circumference.  
The Doctor laughed, "River, it’s late, we’re exhausted! I’m not playing marbles with you!"

She smiled at him, reaching out she asked for his hand and he obliged.  
“Doctor," she said as she brushed his palm softly with her thumb… her eyes observed and recorded each crease and line intently until she could pinpoint her place in his fortune. She met his gaze.  
"Your hands have always been so strong. Your reach is so much further than mine. And your strategy… well, I happily live by the genius of your plans.”  
She placed a large shooter in his hand.  
He looked down and admired it. It was an antique Victorian glass spiral, but it reminded him of a large giant blue star frozen in time just moments before a supernova. He rolled it around reverently in his hand wondering how many games it had seen.  
He knelt up poised to lag his shooter.  
He grinned at River, “Go on then, what are your terms.”  
She grinned back, “With you Doctor, I only have one rule. We always play for keeps.”  
He flexed his thumb and watched his shooter roll.  
He looked over to River, “It’s a promise.” 

_______________________ 

Indoors, the Tardis hummed to herself.  
Everything had followed the right path... they had gotten to where they needed to go...but not quite how she expected.  
Actually it was even better.  
Her Timelords always taught her algorithm a thing or two…. they added to its depth... providing expansions and upgrades.  
They made her more alive.  
And she loved to feel alive.  
Time and again she learned better than to try to predict the beats of their hearts or the next step of their dance.  
It was like they were playing "Giant Steps", and improvising through the Coltrane Changes with each of their hearts modulating in a different key. It was a jazz dance she didn’t know fully ... but it made beautiful music, so she’d keep dancing along anyway.  
Trying to keep up. The circuits beamed through and the console shone… and somewhere in there, the Tardis Time Matrix whispered a Merry Christmas out to her stolen travelers.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Come back later this week for Part 13, The Auton at the Bookstore!


End file.
